Samuel Herbert Adams (January 28, 1858 – May 21, 1945) was an American
sculptor.
Biography
Herbert Adams was born in 1858 at
West Concord,
Vermont, son of
machinist and
patternmaker Samuel Minot Adams and Nancy Powers.[1][2] In 1863, at the age of five, he moved to
Fitchburg, Massachusetts, so his father could take a job at the Putnam Machine Co. His family purchased a home on 26 Chestnut Street. He was educated in the public schools of Fitchburg and Worcester, and at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology.[1] He was influenced by Fitchburg's first Art teacher, Louise Haskell, to pursue a career in Art. He studied art at the
Massachusetts Normal Art School[1] in
Boston and got a teaching certificate. Herbert Adams taught Art in the Fitchburg public schools from 1878 tp 1882, but left Fitchburg for Paris France in 1885 to pursue his interest in sculpture. He was educated at the Massachusetts Normal Art School enrolling in 1877 at 18 years of age, and from 1885 to 1890 he was a pupil of
Antonin Mercié[1] in
Paris.[3]
In 1889 Rodney Wallace, James Phillips, and Henry Willis donated money for an ornamental fountain to grace the Upper Common of Fitchburg, MA and the City accepted the idea. This 26 foot in diameter granite and bronze fountain depicting two playful boys and a family of turtles was the first public commission awarded to Adams and was created in his Paris studio. This was the first, large sculpture, done in the "lost-wax" process, brought to America. During Adams lifetime he completed over 200 major public works of art, and is considered to be one of the most important American sculptors.
^White, James Terry (1906). The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography. p. 511. One of the best of these busts is that of his future wife, which was exhibited at the Chicago Exhibition in 1803.